I know this is a question where the answer is never really correct, but I know there is one out there is is the most correct of them all. I know people say there were about 120,000 that day, and that seems to be the most popular answer, BUT there were about 150,000 people at the Hyde park gig in '76 and it is said that the Knebworth concert was Queen's biggest crowd in the UK. So if that is correct, why is it that people always say that the close estimate of that concert is about 120,000 when its supposed to be bigger than Hyde Park '76 who had a crowd of 150,000?
We will never know for sure what the attendance was but newspapers at the time were saying that it was around 140,000.Although they said that about the Deep Purple gig the year before and there was room to swing a cat there.
I myself would even go as far as to say that there were probably more than 150,000 there.
I was there !! One of the best days of my life!!Perfect weather,Perfect day.Even Quo were good!! Well over 150:000 i would have thought.Stuck in the car park till 2am got home at 7am but boy it was worth it !!
Sorry for the off-topic question but did somebody record the opening bands ? I'd love to get my hands on a recording of the full day, no matter what's the quality
ok well i can speak from experience of both gigs....myself and six mates and my future wife were there
purple 85 - there was plenty of space to walk around - even near the stage (about 20 yrds from front)...also the side stalls around the permiter of the field - there was loads of room
queen 86 - what stunned me was the sea of bodies seemed to go further back up the hill.....and there were stories of a fence on a neighboring field being broken thru and thousands without tickets pouring in...
here's some official figures:
zep - knebworth fair - 79 - 200,000
purple - return of knebworth 85 - 80,000
queen - knebworth magic 86 - 120,000
my guess would be just under 150,000 - but it still dwarfs the other two queen outdoor gigs i went to
wembley 86 - approx 90,000
milton keynes 82 - approx 40,000
I was there, got there early in the morning, no toilet facilities outside of the enclosed area, back of trees are great ;) they were selling official merch' outside of the enclosed area. Soon as they started letting people in, it's the fastest you've ever seen me run to get to the front. Harvey Goldsmith went on stage & told everyone to stop running, which of course nobody listened to him.
later on there was a plastic bottle/food/rubbish fight. people throwing stuff forward, those at the front throwing it back (myself included) more stuff getting lobbed forward & back & so on. all I can say is the high ground won & I must have ended up being about 6" taller, due to all the rubbish I was standing on at the front + plastic bottles don't half hurt when they clock you in the face :(
The helicopter flew over to cheers, later Brian appeared back stage watching "Big Country" through the right hand side rear back drop curtains.
The queen set was great, I remember Brian broke a string on his black telecaster during "Crazy Little Thing Called Love" luckily it was before the Guitar solo & he had enough time to swap guitars & played the solo on his "Red Special"
After the gig, it took me about 2 hours to get out of the park, I remember just turning my car engine off, sitting on the bonnet & me add my mates singing Queen songs along to the Tape cassette player in my car, other fans stuck in the traffic joined in singing.
Originally I was not going to attend this concert, as I had already done Wembley & Manchester before on the tour, Little did I know, that it was going to be the last Queen gig with Freddie, so I'm really glad that I now decided to go.
all in all, it was a great day, even though it was a long tiring one, all my mates fell asleep on the way home, leaving me the only one awake for a good 3 hour journey home, into the early hours of the next morning.........